Boston will be one of the six original teams in the new Professional Women’s Hockey League, according to an industry source Monday night.
Along with Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, New York City, and a team in Minnesota, the new Boston team will begin play in January.
Home ice has yet to be announced, but a recent report from The Hockey News said Boston University’s Walter Brown Arena is being considered.
The PWHL bought out the Premier Hockey Federation (PHF) and all of its teams, including the Boston Pride, earlier this summer.
Professional women’s hockey in North America has been a house divided between the PHF and the Professional Women’s Hockey Players Association for the past several years since the Canadian Women’s Hockey League folded.
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The PWHL is owned by the Mark Walter Group, which includes Walter (among the owners of the Los Angeles Dodgers), tennis legend Billie Jean King, and Dodgers president Stan Kasten, who is overseeing the start-up of the league. For now, the league will own and operate all six teams.
A press conference will be held Tuesday.
Handles on X, previously known as Twitter, have been established, with Boston’s tagline reading “Wicked cool hockey.” The league’s prefixes are at @PWHL.
”I think that the next six months is going to be rocky, but again, that’s inevitable when you have two sides that have been bitter rivals and those two sides come together,” John Boynton, former PHF chair and former co-owner of four of the league’s seven teams, including the Boston Pride, said last month. “It doesn’t happen immediately. But, I think that if everyone proceeds in good faith and puts in the effort and the time, there’s huge potential.
“There’s no reason that the new league should not be mentioned right alongside the WNBA and the NWSL — those three logos should be side by side, every time.”
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Boston is expected to be named an expansion franchise of the National Women’s Soccer League in the coming months.
Michael Silverman can be reached at michael.silverman@globe.com.